An Alternative Celtic Model

For years the EPL and other big leagues in Europe have pulled away from our own humble league up here in Scotland both in terms of exposure and (this is the real kicker) cash. So much so that these days Aston Villa will get more money from playing a couple of games next season than we will get for the whole season WINNNING our league. Of course this isn’t news to anyone on here but let’s be honest what are the alternatives in order to get us where Celtic deserve to be?

1) Better marketing of the league so our TV contract is on a par with other big leagues – Not ever going happen.
2) Joining the EPL – More likely than point one but also highly unlikely and less than desirable.
3) Creating an Atlantic League with the likes of the Norwegians, Dutch, and Belgians etc. – Likeliest out of all three options but still remote and hardly any more desirable

So, if we can’t change the league and we can’t change the funding (yet) what can we change? What can we change about Celtic itself that would improve our exposure and get us back in the thick of it in Europe? I have a crazy idea so please don’t shoot me down and stick with me.

We cannot compete with other teams in other leagues simply by trying to outsmart them in the transfer market and being a selling club. We may keep our head above water but for one, we will never win another European trophy and secondly we are keeping our head above water in the paddling pool while Michael Phelps takes gold in the deep end.

So how about we stop trying to emulate another model and come up with our own? A model that could bring some great names to Celtic Park, help us get back to our charitable roots, generate a ton of goodwill in Europe (we could be everyone’s second favourite team) and perhaps some success. Here’s what I propose.

Instead of us buying young and selling them on why don’t we look to the stars (and I mean big stars) of Europe that are in the twilight of their careers? Maybe Messi or Rooney will be forced to retire in a few years’ time but they might think that they have one last season/shot against the young guys in order to prove they can take one more trophy.

We roll out the red carpet to all those great players near retirement that could commit to us for one more season of their careers to play in front of the greatest fans in the world. They would have another chance at European silverware as Celtic will still qualify almost every year. Give them one opportunity to play with other greats they never normally would have so they could show the young ‘uns a thing or two. The pace of the Scottish Domestic game means that they could probably eke out another season or two and perform on the continent.

The real beauty of this is that Celtic ask them to take a massively reduced salary (or free, like Beckham did at PSG) and the club commits to donating 50% of all ‘profits’ to charitable initiatives. Desmond would probably earn more than he does now in this new model. Maybe I have smoked too much crack but think on this, just for ten minutes. Keane wanted another season in the limelight with us, I bet Larsson would have come back for one more try, Ibrahimović said he would love to finish his career with us a few seasons ago and what if Beckham and Giggs had the chance to play with, rather than against the superstars of their generation, even for a season.

We would still develop the youth squad and the amount of goodwill generated would mean youngsters may actually seek us out as again as a team to play for alongside their childhood heroes. I know, I know it’s pure fantasy land but at least this model is somewhat in our control and it’s way better than the model we have right now, who’s with me?

 

We should sell our own TV rights.

 

sfplfplsplfplfplspldpsplfplfpls rules wont let us i believe.

 

I see what you are thinking of, but a team (starting 11?) made up of that calibre of player would either be extremely expensive on wages - these guys can get 40k their final season in America, China, India, etc - or very much make us a revolving door of a squad, where maybe European fans may take a notion to us more as a '2nd' team, but it would quickly become very * to watch after a year or two as a die hard fan.

I want something in the middle of what you mention and what we have just now. And ill it will take is an initial spend of 15 million (ish), with a continued backing/reinvestment of transfers recieved.

Currently we have three strikers on the books, with only one worth selling and at that probably not worth much in comparison to previous sales (no offence leigh).
Three striker that are eating up 40k a week(decent guestimate). With two young strikers in odonnell and miller needing game time.

I propose we stop spending wages on this sort of player (again, no offence leigh) and transfer fees on idiotic cheap options. And start investing in that one quality striker. And utilise the youth as the rotational player.

In central defence we have boyata, mulgrew, Ambrose, blackett and simunovic. With o'connell and kelcher (?) as youngsters.
Again, get rid of the first four mentioned players (one on loan, fair enough) which must be eating 35k in itself in wage. And buy a quality cb worth their salt to partner simunovic (who has shown great signs and is almost ideal for a partnership with another established cb). And then utilise the youngsters.

We are currently doing it at left back - though probably accidentally. Where we have one established and experiences left back - who is good and worth his wage. But we are now bringing a youngster through.
Right back could be argued with lustig and janko.

Left and right wing. Lets get rid of Gms, forrest, mcgregor, commons, derk, stokes.
And bring in two key players (sammy and aiden as previous players) and get nesbitt and a right wing youngster rotating with them.

Amc position, Armstrong, Allan, johansen - 25k a week. Go spend that on a key player - nakamura!? And then lets see a youngster push his way forward.


And so forth.

The idea being, when Tierney proves he is as good or better than izzy, we sell izzy and Tierney is the established player. We get 2-3million for izzy and we promote the next youngster, or buy in another youngster/project to play rotation to Tierney.
If we promote from within, that is 3million gained.

Take that 3million and realise that the key striker we signed isnt cutting it (say finnbogasson at 5.5milion and 30k a week). Sell him at a (hopefully) smal loss and use the gain off izzy to offset it. 5.5 million player sold for 3million, add on the izzy money and its 6million to go sign a new striker.

Say the nakamura type Amc we have in this hypothetical team hits the limelight and we sell for 12million. If the youngster who was his unserstudy is not ready - go spend 5million at least on a direct replacement. 7million in the bank.
Simunovic has a decent one season and wants a move south, we get 6million, again direct replacement if the youth is not ready.

Its an initial investment of maybe 15million and a desperate need to clear out the deadwood and heavily saturated positions. But its needed.
And the initial idea is the team is fresh and definitely better for the Cl qualifiers and that initial outlay is paid back by the Cl itself. Then its a matter of maintaining it.



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I agree negotiating our own TV rights would be great but I'm not sure they would be as much as you think and there is now way the other teams would allow it.

@TonyStarkCSC - But that model has a ton of risk, what if we spend that and sign another dud? Also, this is no different than the models we had in the past, it is not different enough or a game changer in terms of getting us to compete in Europe let alone win another trophy.

I get that the players will get huge rewards going to the Middle east or the US but not all of them at that stage of their career do it for the money. Heck, what about a season after they've finished in the US/Middle East? If they're fit and still decent maybe they would chomp at the bit to get a last gasp at European Glory? Even if they're a bit of a flop just imagine the publicity and merchandise so we can afford some quality.

 

The signing policy in the past saw us with twice the amount of starting 11 standard players.
Im wanting to litterally see 11 players of a certain calibre /standard that we actually spend money and more calculated scouting risk on. Backed up with youth. The risk in this is injuries. But then I honestly think a starting 11 of that calibre can be supplemented quite well at spl level with youth to keep us winning, injuries included.

Itd take a massive stroke of bad luxk to have 3 or more of that key starting 11 injured during the qualifiers that would hinder us ij qualifications

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With the continuing inflation from England pushing prices up around the Footballing world pushes us into a corner where we are completely up against it, I agree.

I don't believe there are efforts been made to counter it, or even enough in that respect. Our Board think its acceptable to lift a League title that has hardly any prestige or affluence. We simply cannot help that - its Europe we should really be concentrating on and by doing that winning the League title is mandatory.

Right now the current transfer policy leaves us into transitional periods, leaving us out of the expense of multi-million European prize money. This wont change as its interpretation is straight down to corporate dividends and expenses - which is all depending on the shares each shareholder or corporate company holds. The idea that we are in the green all the time benefits us some how is the biggest miscalculation, it only signifies to investors that they will get a good return in dividends over every annual period. Yes, the corporatisation is currently a commodity at our Club and many including Ajax.

The alternative I can only think off is either through these:

- Occasional Share Issues
- Footballing Department/Marquee Signing Fund
- Fan Ownership with a Club membership monthly Subscription
- Our own Independent TV station that includes all rights
- Gain licence into the Barclays Premier League
- External revenue derived from Dermot Desmonds pocket.
- Raise Season Ticket prices to a astronomical rate with a detailed plan to sign better players
- Merge Scandinavian Football Leagues with ours creating a Continental League competition

These are alternatives which I can only think can be realistic for us to get better revenue in the long term to counter the gap with the current inflation.

If we don't things are going to get worse and there is no benefit in people within Scotland, our support and within the game being repudiate about it.

 

I * love that idea chuck!

 

I pretty much agree with all of this, but realistically out of those options what ones are realistic or even in our hands:

- Occasional Share Issues Can only do this for so long
- Footballing Department/Marquee Signing Fund Maybe, but not at the level that i think would make us competitive, also what marquee player wants to play in the SPFL?
- Fan Ownership with a Club membership monthly Subscription This is good, but I just can't see it happening
- Our own Independent TV station that includes all rights Great but out of our hands
- Gain licence into the Barclays Premier League Unlikely and out of our hands
- External revenue derived from Dermot Desmonds pocket.Never gonna happen
- Raise Season Ticket prices to a astronomical rate with a detailed plan to sign better players I'm not sure fans would trust the management with that kind of war chest, besides we are having enough trouble getting fans through the turnstyles now
- Merge Scandinavian Football Leagues with ours creating a Continental League competition I like this option but again, out of our hands

I am trying to start a discussion about something we could do right now with minimal risk and no real extra cost (I know it's contingent on a ton of other things). Here is another scenario, if we don't do something soon this will only get worse, not better. The longer we are away from the European stage and remain uncompetitive is another step into obscurity. How much longer will it be before a generation of football fans know the likes of Leicester and Southampton better than us?

 

Signing old stars in the twilight of their career is the worst cost benefit possible in football.

Celtic is not an indian or chinese team that needs this. I am not being optimistic or doing some cheap bravado. Every football fan knows about Celtic in Brazil. We are still, for now, a bigger brand than Crystal Palace or Southampton. Same in Sweden, Slovakia, Iceland, all the place I have been to. To put us in this "we are doomed!" position is too much of an inferiority complex, one fed and kept alive by our board.

While the outrageous money that meaningless english clubs who have less supporters than Aberdeen make even in the Championship is obviously a problem, there is still a lot that can be done within our means, our budgets if there is a little bit of ambition and competence. We could have spent 1 million more in a striker just once rather than buying probably more than a dozen of strikers in the 2-3 million mark.

Thing is something that corporate fat cats love is riskless investiment. We live in a corporate short termist culture now. Lawwell, Bankier, Dermot, all the scum milking our club that couldnt give a * about what happens in the pitch and how happy the supporters are, won't risk one or two million to keep the reputation of the club intact.

It's a mistake to think that the board is being cheap and playing safe. I pointed out many times that the type of player we bring from EPL development squads and Dundee United costed more than much more efficient signings that scandinavian and central european teams did. We are not a cautious and penniless club, just an incredibly unambitious and lazy one, because our board know they will make money no matter what

Yes, if we keep failing to qualify for the UCL and doing ridiculous runs at Europa League this will no longer be the case. But by now saying we couldn't make a team good enough to compete with FC Kobenhavn, Rapid Wien, Basel, etc, all who come from equally poor leagues that no one cares about and as of now would rip us a new * if we met them.

 

I don't know how to get there but as I pointed above, the only solution is fan ownership. People who really care about the club on the top. I don't want to see all the ridiculous boycott and riot scenes that we would see at Sevco though. Maybe, we could have our FC United of Manchester, a fan owned club, commited to charity, cheap tickets, living wage to the employees and all antifascist and racist values of Celtic, climbing up from the Lowland League. Would be more entertaining and fulfilling to watch than a Celtic B (a suggestion made by many) and could help putting pressure on the board.

 

Yeap I agree this will only last for so long, this is a good 'starter' to keep funds to use it in a long term strategy.

FC Köln did this to acquire Lukas Podolski, I don't see why we cannot do it unless some in here are under the illusion that FC Köln are bigger than us.

That is a good groundwork core alternative, that needs to happen in the long term. The current corporatisation cannot continue as the distance between fans and boardroom level is a ocean apart.

Again this touches up with the fan ownership alternative, it reinforces that action.

You're probably right in this one, they have knocked us back twice already. Its estimated that we would triple overnight if we got into the Barclays Premier League...

I agree, shame he should be doing better hes more interested in his handicap than our Club.

I think you're right on this one but its just something I could think off.

That is FA representation level, Lawwell sits both on our Board and the SFA I doubt there is ambitions to that degree.

Thats how its going to project if we do not get into action.

 

Another thing that could help us would be the Scottish Independence.

Yes. Thing is the stupid work permit system keeps us from filling up the squad with cheap south americans and africans, a problem that eastern european clubs don't have, for example. This system is an imposition from british immigration laws and an independent Scotland would almost certainly have more flexible policies.

It did little to nurture british talent and now with the european freedom of movement it's a completely irrelevant policy. This will never change in the United Kingdom as even this extremely small step would sound bad in the ears of the xenophobic and obsessed british public opinion.

 

Right but that's my point, I'm not being defeatist. We have to use a different model (whatever that is) than other, richer teams to get the same results. I am merely suggesting an alternative that would work within the current limitations and it also means our destiny is on our own hands not the decisions of others.

Also, you are quoting, one, two or three million for a striker - I don't want to sign a three million pound striker because that is not enough, you're not thinking ambitious or big enough, you are sounding defeatist.

You say, "we couldn't make a team good enough to compete with FC Kobenhavn, Rapid Wien, Basel, etc". I also don't want to compete with or be on a level with those teams. So, outwith the conventional model how can we compete with the top tier teams in Europe?

There are a boatload of super smart people on this forum but loosening the purse strings just a bit is not going to get us where we want/deserve to be. I don't have all the answers but I thought I would throw this out there and see what really is viable. I haven't seen any massive drawbacks to what I proposed and it could have the desired effect. Would you rather have Ciftci or a Messi or a Larsson that have been retired for a couple of years?

 

I completely agree here.

The inferiority complex is so entrenched in the support that many are reinforced by the belief that a little ambition could kill us or even see us get poorer players with a bigger success rate. Its incredible. We should be having the belief that we can win the Europa League and use that success to go as far as possible in the Champions League. Anything less is completely unacceptable. Just being the best of the latter in Scotland and hold that limit of ambition is inaccurate representation of our size from a worldwide perspective, in fact its embarrassing.

We should be doing everything we can to get as much revenue in as possible from external to internal methods because at the end of the day we are the Club and if we leave to those in power we will be heading to a brick wall.

 

I tried to not call you defeatist because you don't deserve that, would sound offensive. I totally understand why you think that way, I just don't agree

Now it's me who is going to sound a bit unambitious but we never were a top club on par with Barcelona or Real Madrid. We won the European Cup in an age where the rules were different and even a Partizan Belgrade or Steaua could come close to it. We always were a degree under than the top clubs but still a club with a global reach.

Just to use my case as an example: I am 26 years old. I am a brazilian living in Sweden. I never lived a single minute of my life in Scotland. My first team is now Celtic, I can't follow the brazilian third tier team I support from here and none of the swedish teams caught my attention.

I became a Celtic fan in the early 2000s. By then we were more or less in the same situation as of now, reaching the UCL group stages weren't a given but something to be expected. I remember how crazy I went in that match against Milan.

Big stars were never what brought people like me to Celtic. It was the Green Brigade, the rebel connection, the left wing politics, the most beautiful jersey of the big clubs in the world and in my special case that a bunch of cool indie rock stars also supported us. I don't think that I am the type of fan that celtic should cater for but Celtic will keep getting weird brazilians, swedes, asians and americans that love it (unlike sevco with their vile tribe of small minded bigots that doesn't reach further than East Belfast) as long as this magic and ideology is kept. This is what is needed for the brand to be valued. The team in the pitch just doesnt need to not be embarassing, and currently it is.

Old star players are as I said in the competitive aspect of it a terrible cost benefit. Take for example Ronaldinho. He is a free agent and a semi retired player now. By his last performances in the brazilian league he doesnt have enough for putting Commons in the bench right now. This is the sort of guy we would be after. I don't think we need this. We have our own heroes. And them, Larsson, Nakamura, they came for what I said: 1 or 1,5 million than the * we have now. The next Larsson could be in an eastern european league but our greedy parasites at the board and the incompetents the hired for it won't spot it, and if they do will refuse to pay 500k more than they would in some SPL guy. It's infuriating. *, even Larsson Jr, he is 17/18, playing for a team with big financial problems needing the cash, and I have seen him play in the flesh several times, both professionally and in under 21 matches and can guarantee that at very least he would be better than Ciftci. People would go bonkers with a shirt no7 again with the surname Larsson on it. He would cost 2 million at MOST. It's unbelievable that nobody at our club ever thought about it. Why do we have scouts? Who is the idiot employed in Scandinavia?

As it seemed that I attacked you for your suggestion: no, I just don't agree and actually I think it's quite good that you created this topic. Thanks for that

 

Hopefully someone from the board will read this thread and see the light , Failing that perhaps one or two should get in touch and offer their services

 

It's a great idea - if it was to work. But - is this not essentially what Rangers tried to do during the Murray era? Except of course they only made it look like £15m of their own money.

 

I can just see Messi and Rooney electing to play in Glasgow against Motherwell in front of a half empty Celtic Park ahead of playing in the sun in the USA in front of huge crowds a earning about 5 times as much.

Paul the Tim vs a load of bronzed babes in Miami? No contest.